Nick, Rhonda, Reese, Finn, Charlie, Rio and Sally Jenkins

Ruminating on John Edwards’s Fall

Oh how I’ve never liked John Edwards. The “two Americas” stuff, the talking to dead children, the 28,200-foot house — all too much for me. So I can’t say I was too bummed to hear that he cheats on his wife. As in — career over.

Bad things happen to bad people.

Some thoughts, in no particular order:

This may impact the presidential election. Remember how the Democrats made Mark Foley a poster child for the larger theme of “Republican scandal” in the ’06 election cycle? The Republicans have the same opportunity here. Edwards and Elliott Spitzer, among others, become poster children for “Democrat hypocrisy.”

As for Barack Obama, some in the blogosphere are already ruminating that the Edwards matter could haunt the Chosen One in November. Edwards joins Messrs. Rezko, Wright, et al in the pantheon of bad guys with whom Barack breaks bread. That’s guilt by association, and I don’t buy it. The better play is for Republicans to turn it into a broader theme of Democratic hypocrisy. If “Democrat” becomes synonymous with “hypocrite,” as “Republican” did with “scandal” in ’06, then the slaughterfest that so many pundits predict may not come to pass. As for a “Barack Obama as hypocrite” theme — the material is available (1I2).

I wondered how long it would take the mainstream media to start referring to this adultery as a “tragedy” and, sure enough, it’s already happening. Check out Rob Tully’s blog entry yesterday on LATimes.com. Rob, a “tragedy” is what happens when circumstances get the best of innocents — a child is killed by a drunk driver, a family dies in a plane crash, etc. Knowingly doing the horizontal hop with someone who isn’t your wife is not in the same league.

As much as I hate to admit it, there are two Americas, as Mr. Edwards has long maintained — the one where his terminally-ill wife resides, and the other one, where he hangs out with his girlfriend. And if the love-child-with-Rielle-Hunter rumors are true, the King of All Hypocrites will have a family for each America. (Sidenote: for afternoon reading, google [“John Edwards” hypocrisy] and wonder how anyone could have ever given this guy a cent.)